Doctoral Dissertation Research: Prefixal Agreement, Verb Classes, and Serialization

本论文致力于对一种代际传播迅速减少、研究不足的语言进行详细的文献记录和研究。这种语言表现出一些在其语言家族中相对独特的结构特征；深入研究形态一致和动词类别的起源有可能揭示理论语言学中更广泛的问题，如词汇项的潜在表征，同时也加深了我们对语言随时间变化和发展的方式的理解。此外，该项目旨在为未来对相关语言差异的研究提供坚实的经验基础，促进我们对该地区及其周围地区发现的类型学模式的了解。最后，该项目的目标是与以英语为母语的顾问密切合作并公开存档的数据将是多功能的，适合改编成面向社区的文学、教学和参考材料，促进当地在语言维护和保存方面的努力。研究人员将与以英语为母语的人进行实地考察，以便彻底记录和分析语法结构，特别是从共时和历时的角度关注语言的形态系统及其与其他句法和语音现象的接口。特别是，这个项目建立在一个假设的基础上，即存在一个发展中的初始词形变化类别系统，其中特定动词集的前缀形状的选择在语音或语义上不再是可预测的。通过对动词类、配价、语态和系列化的亚系统变化的深入研究，本研究旨在阐明如下问题：一)主语一致和半特殊动词类的结构地位和历史渊源；二)代词成分的分布及其与格和对齐发展的交集；三)配价和范畴变化的派生词法的语法化及其与词汇项抽象表征的关系。因此，这项工作有可能有助于我们从跨语言的角度更广泛地理解形态句法理论，同时也为一个研究不足的语言家族的研究带来了一个新的历时视角。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This dissertation project focuses on the detailed documentation and study of an under-studied language with rapidly decreasing intergenerational transmission. The language displays a number of structural characteristics which are relatively unique within its language family; deeper investigation into the origin of morphological agreement and verb classes has the potential to shed light on broader issues within theoretical linguistics such as the underlying representation of lexical items, while also furthering our understanding of the ways in which languages change and develop over time. In addition, this project aims to provide a solid empirical foundation for future research into variation across related languages, contributing to our knowledge of typological patterns found in and around the region. Finally, it is a goal of the project that the resulting data, processed in close collaboration with native speaker consultants and publicly archived, will be multifunctional and suitable for adaptation into community-facing literary, pedagogical, and reference material, facilitating local efforts at language maintenance and preservation.The researcher will conduct on-site fieldwork with native speakers in order to thoroughly document and analyze grammatical structure with particular focus on the language's morphological systems and their interface with other syntactic and phonological phenomena from both a synchronic and diachronic perspective. In particular, this project is built around the hypothesis that there is a developing incipient inflection class system, wherein the choice of prefix shape with a particular set of verbs is no longer phonologically or semantically predictable. By closely investigating sub-systemic alternations in verb class, valency, voice, and serialization, this project aims to shed light on issues such as i) the structural status and historical origin of subject agreement and semi-idiosyncratic verb classes; ii) the distribution of pronominal elements and their intersection with the development of case and alignment; and iii) the grammaticalization of valency- and category-changing derivational morphology and their relationship to the abstract representation of lexical items. Thus, this work has the potential to contribute to our broader understanding of morphosyntactic theory cross-linguistically, while also bringing a novel diachronic perspective to the study of an understudied language family.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.